


Progression

by Spamberguesa



Series: Obsession [6]
Category: The Hobbit - All Media Types
Genre: F/M, Finally, Lima Syndrome, Stockholm Syndrome, but still a creeper, captive tauriel, not nearly so creeper thranduil, she has learned the buttons to push, she kind of had to, sly tauriel, these two are a goddamn mess, yes thranduil engage brain
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-12
Updated: 2015-08-12
Packaged: 2018-04-14 10:03:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,396
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4560462
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Spamberguesa/pseuds/Spamberguesa
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which Thranduil finally starts to realize the sheer enormity of what he's done, and Tauriel tries for freedom.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Progression

**Author's Note:**

> Not gonna lie, I cried while I wrote this, and I never do that.

Huoriel’s visits helped immensely, though Tauriel also felt somewhat guilty – given that they remained confined to Thranduil’s rooms, her friend probably found it rather dull.

At least she didn’t have to come every day. With the kingdom so quiet, Thranduil frequently took partial or full days off, and spent them in the garden or forest with her, out in the sunshine. While Tauriel could not say she was _happy_ – she never would be, so long as her freedom was so curtailed – she was, for now, more or less content. Which was a massive, massive improvement.

And Thranduil, she found, could be wickedly funny when he felt like it. His spot-on impersonation of Lord Falchon made her laugh so hard she nearly cried.

“You should not mock the poor ellon so,” she said, lying back on the grass. It had recently been cut, and the sweet scent of it still lingered.

“And yet he makes it so easy,” Thranduil snorted. “He is fortunate I do not say so to his face. He agrees with everything I say almost before I have finished saying it, and looks so insufferably smug while doing so. Clearly, he feels I actually value his opinion.”

“Then why do you keep him on your council?” she asked, lacing her hands behind her head. The canopy above her was thick and green, letting down shafts of sunlight that warmed her face.

He joined her on the grass, absently toying with her hair. “Because if I did not, he would do his best to make trouble, and not of the sort that entertains me. Court intrigue is tedious, and I would prefer to avoid it where I can.”

“I cannot imagine anyone scheming against you,” she said, and meant it. Thranduil could be so very intimidating, whether he wanted to be or not. “I do not think you realize how very softly people tread around you.” Even Legolas had, to an extent, though she was hardly going to say _that_. That was something Thranduil would have to hear from his mouth, not hers.

“They are lucky I am not my father,” he said. “Few who knew him remain on this shore, but he had a fearsome temper. Far more so than I.”

 _That_ was a terrifying thought. Thranduil’s rages were infamous for a reason. “Was he a dreadful tyrant?”

“On the whole, no. He was always fair in his ruling, but those who crossed him repented of it immensely. The dungeons were far more heavily occupied in his day.”

Tauriel turned her head to look at him. In the sunlight, his profile looked like it had been carved of luminescent marble. “He would shut away his own people?” she asked, incredulous.

“Often without hesitation,” he said, “though some more readily than others. The nobles had more cause for fear.”

His tone was such that Tauriel burst out laughing. “Why have you not maintained the tradition?”

He looked back at her. “Too much effort,” he intoned solemnly, arching an eyebrow.

That set her off all over again. “I would never have thought you would have found anything too much effort,” she said. “Except, perhaps, sobriety.” The wine had been flowing freely this entire afternoon, as it often did when he was near.

“I only put effort into things I decide are worth it,” he said, turning on his side to run his knuckles down her cheek. The touch made her shiver, but it did not frighten her – as ever, while there was a strange kind of desire in it, it was not carnal. She probably ought to be disturbed by how pleasant it was, but strangely, she was not. It was not a silent request for anything she would not give.

“Then perhaps it would be easier simply to color Lord Falchon’s hair pink,” she said. “It would render the dungeon unnecessary, as he would not dare leave his rooms and face the inevitable ridicule.” 

Thranduil’s smile was so warm that she wished she was seeing it under other circumstances. However pleasant their afternoons and evenings, he was still holding her prisoner. Always that thought lurked at the back of her mind, no matter how he distracted her with his words and his laughter and his little touches. The madness in his eyes had subsided, but that strange possessiveness lingered, and she didn’t think it would ever fully leave. Not if it was as deeply-rooted as she suspected.

 _Why_ did he have to have gone about things this way? Had things been different, had he approached her like a normal, sane person, perhaps she might have been receptive to him. He had shown her a side of himself that she would have found charming if he wasn’t her jailer. A deep, dark part of her did anyway, but she chalked _that_ up to her near-total isolation. When he was with her, all his attention was focused upon her – and now that he was not blatantly insane, that could be…nice. It shouldn’t be, but it was.

“Perhaps I will do that,” he said, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear. “If only to see his face when I give the order.”

“Paint a picture, once you have,” she said, and paused. She feared to ask her next question equally as much as she needed to, because he would almost certainly deny her, but she asked anyway. “Thranduil, Midsummer approaches. Will you not take me with you to the feast?” She chose her words carefully; she knew that saying ‘let me go’ would be met with outright refusal, because he was still _slightly_ mad. She waited for his answer with a trepidation she hated – going to a feast should not be something she would have to ask permission for, let alone need to negotiate. 

Thranduil shut his eyes and turned away, the sun lighting on his face. “Tauriel…”

“ _Please_ , Thranduil,” she said, and the only thing that kept her request from sounding like outright begging was her tone, which was as firm as she could make it. “I have not missed a Midsummer’s feast in all the time I have lived in your halls.” 

She sat up on her elbow, touching his face, silently ordering him to open his eyes. “I do not know why you still insist on keeping me confined,” she said, meeting his gaze steadily. “I can easily come to you in the evening, and those can remain exactly as they are. This time I do not lie when I say I do not wish to part from you, but I need you to trust me. I need you to know that I will not leave you if you give me freedom.”

He had to see the truth in her eyes. He _had_ to. She held her breath when he traced his forefinger over her brow, his own eyes bright and searching.

“I will think on it, Tauriel,” he said. “You are right – someday I must bring myself to let you out. You must understand, Tauriel, it is not you I mistrust. There are those who would take you from me, whether you will or no.”

It wasn’t what she wanted to hear – especially since his last sentence was rank paranoia – but it was better than straight refusal. “They could _try_ to take me away,” she said. “You know as well as I how poorly that would end, and not for me.”

“My heart knows that, Tauriel,” he said, pulling her down to kiss her brow. “It is my mind that doubts.”

“Well, think on this,” she said, sitting up so that she might look him in the eye. She’d just had a brilliant idea, or so she hoped. “If those who would seek to take me from you see that I am content, they will be less likely to try.”

“Content?” he said, trailing his fingers along her jaw. “Not happy?”

“I still mourn, Thranduil,” she said honestly. “Mourning rather precludes happiness.” She had been more able to mourn in the last fortnight, now that she did not spend every waking – and most of her sleeping – hours fearing him. “It has not yet been half a year since I lost Kili.”

He closed his eyes. “Of course,” he said. “You cannot be happy yet. But I hope that, someday, I can make you so.”

“I do, too,” she said, though she was not so certain of the truth in that declaration. She wanted to be happy again eventually, but after all Thranduil had done, she was not sure he could ever be the one to give it to her. No matter how kind he was, no matter how much she enjoyed his company, she could never forget the chain. She would never be able to truly trust him again.

And strangely, that grieved her. Perhaps they truly could have had something with one another, had he not been such a possessive fool.

\--

To her surprise – and distinct pleasure – he left the doors to the garden ajar when they went to bed. She didn’t even mind that it was likely another sort of test; what mattered was that she could sleep in fresh night air, with moonlight on her face. And he had to trust her, if he was willing to give such a test.

Tauriel lay long awake, watching the silvery beams of light that pierced the forest’s canopy. It was a sight she had so long taken for granted during her centuries of patrol, but now it made her silently weep with relief.

Naturally, Thranduil somehow knew of it. “Why are you crying?” he asked, the words a warm breath against her hair.

Thoughtlessly, she answered, “I never thought I would see moonlight again.”

Behind her, he tensed, and she felt him rest his forehead against the crown of her head. His arm tightened a little around her middle. “Have I made you so very miserable, Tauriel?” he asked, and she was shocked at the raw _anguish_ in his voice. It was so intense that she was actually tempted to lie, but she had promised him she would not do that again.

“Yes,” she said simply. “Not anymore, but until the last fortnight, yes, you did. I did not try to take my own life for no reason.”

It was brutal, but it was the truth, and sooner or later he needed to hear it. At least now she did not fear he would hurt her for uttering it.

She was even more shocked when she felt the wet heat of tears on the back of her neck. “I am sorry, Tauriel,” he said, and he sounded so very, very broken. “I am sorry for everything. I am sorry I cannot let you go.”

It had not occurred to her before that perhaps Thranduil was much a slave to his madness as she was. She shut her eyes a moment. “I would not go far. _Why_ can you not believe me? Why can you not believe that I will return, if you do not keep me locked up?”

“I do not know,” he said, and she could feel his eyelashes brush against her skin. “I do not know, but I cannot.”

Tauriel turned to face him, and her heart nearly broke when he raised his head to look at her. Even after all the hell he had put her through, seeing him like this was so, so wrong. This was an entirely new Thranduil, yet another to add to the collection she had met. Whatever words she had been about to speak fled her when she saw the agony in his eyes.

“Tauriel, could you ever love me?” he asked, cupping the side of her face.

She shut her eyes again, unable to bear the sight of his pain. “Perhaps I could have, once,” she said, incapable of holding back her tears, “but no.”

“Why not?” he asked, his thumb tracing one hot tear-track. The sheer tenderness of the gesture only hurt even more.

“Because even if you gave me my freedom tomorrow,” she said, her breath hitching on a brutally suppressed sob, her eyes opening of their own accord, “even if my life became what it always was, and you gave me everything I could ever want, I could never forget the chain.”

She thought she could pinpoint the exact moment his heart shattered – and, though it was entirely his own fault, she still grieved for him. He had lost so very much, but this loss was his own doing, and he knew it.

He pulled her close, and she no longer bothered trying to contain her own weeping. She could have loved him, had he but show her the side of him she had come to know without the preceding insanity, and that hurt more than anything. She wrapped her arms around him, though it was no comfort to her, and probably not to him, either.

“Do you hate me?” he asked, his voice hoarse, fingers twining almost desperately in her hair.

“No,” she said, resting her forehead in the crook of his neck. “I should, but I do not. I do not love you, Thranduil, but neither do I wish to part from you.”

His arms tightened around her, but it was not as his embraces had been before – this time, she did not feel smothered. “Would you stay with me, if I left the doors unlocked?” he asked. “Would you come back each night and lie beside me, and listen to the foolishness of my days?”

She should say no, but, twisted as it was, _wrong_ as it was, she didn’t want to. “Only if you promise me you will not lock me in again.”

Thranduil exhaled a ragged breath into her hair. “I promise,” he said. “I swear I will never confine you anywhere again.”

Tauriel did not actually believe that, but she believed that he believed it. It would have to be good enough, until he inevitably failed. “Then yes,” she said, “I will come back to you.” Where she would actually go _tomorrow_ , she did not know, but it didn’t matter. Freedom would be enough.

“Will you ever forgive me?”

“Someday,” she said. _When I no longer have nightmares about the chain_. And she had no idea how long _that_ would take. “Go to sleep, Thranduil. I will still be here when you wake.”

**Author's Note:**

> Oh dear. Now we’ve got Lima Syndrome joining the Stockholm Syndrome. These two are such a mess. At least Thranduil is finally, _finally_ starting to realize the sheer enormity of what he’s done.


End file.
